The Henry Smith Charity was founded in England in 1628
from the will of Henry Smith, a moneylender and landowner.
Henry Smith was born in
Wandsworth in 1548. He was a
City of London merchant, moneylender and
alderman. From 1620 he began to establish various charitable trusts, and when he died in 1628 he left £1000 for the ransom of English sailors captured by
Barbary pirates
The Barbary pirates, or Barbary corsairs or Ottoman corsairs, were Muslim pirates and privateers who operated from North Africa, based primarily in the ports of Salé, Rabat, Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli, Libya, Tripoli. This area was known i ...
.
His monument is in
All Saints Church, Wandsworth
All Saints Church, Wandsworth, is a Grade II* listed church in Wandsworth High Street, London. It is a Church of England parish church, and the original parish church of Wandsworth.
Origins
There has been a church on the site since at least 1234, ...
.
The charity owned the Smith's Charity estate in
Kensington
Kensington is a district in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in the West End of London, West of Central London.
The district's commercial heart is Kensington High Street, running on an east–west axis. The north-east is taken up b ...
which was established on farmland in Kensington and Chelsea in 1685.
The Henry Smith Charity sold their South Kensington estate to the
Wellcome Trust for £280 million in 1995.
Today, the charity makes a variety of grants, primarily to social welfare and disadvantaged groups. Beneficiaries include registered charities, community and Christian based organisations and individuals. At the end of the 2017 financial year the Henry Smith Charity had an income of £12.5 million with grants totalling £31 million. The charity had assets worth over £1 billion.
References
{{reflist
External links
The Henry Smith Charity
Charities based in London
1628 establishments in England
History of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea